From: Adrian von Bidder (avbidderfortytwo.ch)
Date: Tue May 31 2005 - 04:56:06 CDT

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On Tuesday 31 May 2005 11.25, Sipos Gabor wrote:

> > Running such a mixed stable/testing system usually will work (although
> > it makes automatic package upgrades a bit more complicated.) Breaking
> > dependencies (with 'dpkg --force' options) will usually *not* work for
> > long, and the packaging system is allergic to a system in an
> > inconsistent state (i.e. with broken dependencies) with good reason.
>
> Exactly, so installing unofficial packages is out of question.

Huh? Neither installing unofficial packages nor running a mixed
stable/testing system will break the consistency of the packaging system.

Packages from backports.org - though unofficial - are quite well-tested, and
installing them won't get your packaging system into an inconsistent state.
So if you don't want to upgrade right now, I'd say your best bet is
installing postfix from backports.org. (Note that most of the people behind
backports.org are Debian developers - the same people us already trust by
running Debian.

By 'inconsistent state' of the packaging system I mean 'using --force
options on dpkg', for instance to override when dpkg complains about a
missing dependency. In the case of backports.org, you will find all
missing dependencies either in woody or on backports.org. (Or you can add
backports.org to your sources.list, so you can use
apt-get/aptitude/synaptic/...; I recommend thoroughly reading 'man
apt_preferences' first, though.)

Upgrades from backports.org to the next stable version are not guaranteed,
but a quick look at the postfix package in backports, it seems that the
backports.org postfix package is based on a recent testing/sarge postfix
package, with relatively few changes, so there shouldn't be a problem.

Ok, this gets really off topic for this list, feel free to continue this
off-list, or ask on the debian-user mailing list about more advice.

cheers
-- vbi

--
featured link: http://www.pool.ntp.org

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